Friday, March 28, 2008

Cynsational News, Links & Giveaway

From the promotional copy: "Will Corrine make a deal with the dark Fey Prince? Corrine and her friends race to London, in the hopes of finding a rathstone that will help them end this terrible war with the Fey. The girls search the Victorian city only to find that their plan has led to more danger than ever before. With the girls' lives on the line, the Fey Prince offers Corrine a deal: become his consort and her friends can go in peace. Will Corrine fall into the Fey Prince's arms to save her friends? Or can she find another way?"

Need to catch up first? Enter to win a copy of By Venom's Sweet Sting (Mirrorstone, 2007). To enter, email me with your name and snail/street mail address by 10 p.m. CST April 30! Please also type "By Venom's Sweet Sting" in the subject line. Note: one copy will be awarded to any Cynsations YA reader, and one copy will be awarded to a member of Tantalize Fans Unite! at MySpace. Please identify yourself accordingly as part of your entry!

Blog Book Tours by Elizabeth O. Dulemba Note: previously published in the September-October 2007 SCBWI Bulletin. Here's a sneak peek: "Blog book tours are suddenly quite popular as a quick, inexpensive way for famous (or not so famous) authors to get the word out about their new releases to an exponentially growing audience." Note: Elizabeth also has launched Coloring Page Tuesdays for those of you looking for fun!

Presenting Carrie Jones, from Tori at Journey of an Inquiring Mind. Here's a sneak peek: "The first non-poetry writing I remember was a MASSIVE Star Trek story of 200-plus pages that I wrote the summer before fifth grade. I wrote it for my brother, because I didn't have enough money to buy him something cool like golf balls for his birthday." Learn more about Carrie's latest release, Love and Other Uses for Duct Tape (Flux, 2008). Read a Cynsations interview with Carrie.

Blog Book Tour with illustrator Elizabeth O. Dulemba on Paco and the Giant Chili Plant, written by Keith Polette (Raven Tree, 2008). From the promotional copy: Paco and the Giant Chil Plant / Paco y la planta de chile gigante is a bilingual (English/Spanish) embedded text picture book with all the fun of a fairy tale twisted into a humorous variation. Based on the classic 'Jack and the Bean Stalk' fairy tale, Polette uses the desert Southwest as an unexpected setting. Filled with prickly pears and such, our story moves from the sandy earth into a cloudy domain where anything is possible." Check out tie-in activities! See also Elizabeth's blog for her recent interviews with Kerry Madden, Karen Lee, Alan Gratz, Kim Norman, and more!

Presenting Melissa Marr, also from Tori at Journey of an Inquiring Mind. Here's a sneak peek: "The type of faeries I'm interested in are the ones from old lore: complex characters with sometimes impenetrable motivations, moody faeries with volatile tempers, faeries who play with semantics when they speak." Learn more about Melissa's latest release, Ink Exchange (HarperCollins, 2008). Read a Cynsations interview with Melissa.

Tips on Writing: Making the Most of Your Writing Group by Jo Knowles. Here's a sneak peek: "I say responding because I think this is much more helpful to the writer than 'critiquing.' After a person reads, let the responders take a minute or two of quiet time to gather thoughts and take notes. This can be torture for the writer waiting to hear what people thought, but I think it's worth it to let people take a minute to, well, think." Read a Cynsations interview with Jo. Source: Devas T Rants and Raves.

Johnston to Start New Imprint at S&S: "Allyn Johnston is joining Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing as v-p and publisher of a yet-to-be named imprint, effective immediately. Her imprint, which will concentrate on picture books and middle-grade fiction, will be located in San Diego." Congratulations, Allyn! Source: Publishers Weekly.

The Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers: "focused on using story as a means of conveying traditional and contemporary values and ideals, as well as articulating the need and desire for Native people to create their own paths and visions. We look to help increase leadership capacity in Native youth and Native communities. Ideally, we, as Native People, need to find our own way, develop our own leaders, ensure that our stories are told--past, present, and future--for all time." Note: it was an honor to be named, along with Joy Harjo, a 2001 Wordcraft Writer of the Year--Children's Literature for Rain Is Not My Indian Name (HarperCollins, 2001). Note: scroll for list of more honorees. Source: Debbie Reese at American Indians in Children's Literature, who has been named a Writer of the Year for her work on that blog.

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About

New York Times & Publishers Weekly best-selling, award-winning author the Tantalize series, the Feral series and other critically acclaimed fiction for young readers. MFA Faculty, Vermont College of Fine Arts. Board member, We Need Diverse Books. Ohonvyetv!